Virtual care services provider KeyCare partners with Deaconess Health System

KeyCare is a company on a mission to ensure that health systems can provide patients with a more consistent, higher quality experience, allowing health systems to augment their care teams and optimize capacity by partnering with a nationwide network of virtual care groups.

The company, which built its platform with Epic, has partnered with health systems such as Memorial Healthcare System in Florida and Samaritan Health Services in Oregon and now it added a new partner, announcing that Deaconess Health System will be deploying its platform to a population of more than 1.5 million in Indiana, Illinois and Kentucky.

Through this collaboration, Deaconess patients will be able to obtain virtual urgent care with licensed providers via telehealth. The service provides a convenient option for treating routine medical issues such as colds, fevers, headaches, nausea, allergies, sore throats, urinary tract infections, and back pain.

"KeyCare is an excellent partner for Deaconess because of our shared commitment to providing high quality patient care anytime, anywhere to the communities we serve. Our patients love MyChart! With KeyCare inside of EPIC, our patients have a seamless experience," Amanda Bohleber, MD, Chief Transformation Officer at Deaconess, told VatorNews.

"We aim to have virtual access for all of our patients no matter when or where they need it.  KeyCare’s Epic-based virtual care brings the 24/7 nationwide coverage we need directly to our patients through MyChart."

In addition to the services it provides to health systems, Keycare also allows patients to schedule appointments with a variety of Virtualists via their own health system's MyChart portal or call center. The Virtualists then complete the encounter on KeyCare’s Epic platform; the patient's data is made available to the Virtualists, and their virtual care notes are sent back into the health system’s EHR.

Since 2023, KeyCare has gone live with on-demand urgent care, and its virtual care marketplace of solutions has expanded to include scheduled urgent care, primary care, behavioral health and other specialties, such as rheumatology.

Deaconess' launch with KeyCare will focus on access for minor acute illnesses to keep patients out of urgent cares and emergency rooms when that higher level of care is not needed, Bohleber explained. 

"Our patients can now get their minor acute illnesses addressed quickly and easily all within their MyChart, while our providers will have improved in-person access for their more complex patients," she said.

"We aim to have virtual access for all of our patients no matter when or where they need it.  KeyCare’s on-demand virtual care access brings quality care directly to our patients the moment they need it."